Coca-Cola, Infosys to fight against plastic pollution in India

It’s almost World Environment Day and talks about saving the environment naturally come up this time of the year – this year, it is likely to be anti-plastic campaigns. Voicing with the programmes to fight plastic pollution, some companies like Coca Cola, Infosys and Hilton among others, have pledged to work against the intensifying problem of plastic pollution in India.

This year, India is the host of United Nations’ World Environment Day on June 5 and thanks to the UN Environment Programme’s #beatplasticpollution campaign that the issue of plastic is back in talks again. For India, the fight against plastic pollution is usually “saying no to plastic bags” (classic typical), however, the fight has shifted to fighting single-use plastics more broadly. In fact, common people can be seen looking for biodegradable plastic aka bio-plastic options over the one-time use plastic, since they are said to be less polluting.

Even the government has been sensitising the issue of plastic pollution with the theme of ‘Beat plastic pollution’ on the occasion of World Environment Day. Acting upon the issue, some companies including Coca Cola, Infosys and Hilton among others have pledged to address the growing issue of plastic pollution in India. Coca Cola India Vice President Ishteyaque Amjad has notified regarding the same saying, “We have pledged to recover and recycle one package for every single one that we put out in the market by 2030.” The company’s bottle packaging manufacturer Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages has already initiated the process by starting up a recycling project in Mumbai and Goa; and will soon be opening up in Bhopal too.

Likewise, IT biggie Infosys has pledged to make its campuses non-recyclable plastics-free and is dedicated to cut down its per capita generation of plastic waste by half – both by 2020. To make the campuses plastic free, Infosys will replace PET (Polyethylene Terephthalate) water bottles, plastic carry bags, food sachets, toiletries, garbage bin liners and business card holders among other plastic items with environment-friendly materials. On the same page, the Hilton Group of hotel chains, which has over 5,300 hotels in over 100 countries – and around 7 in India has vowed to eliminate plastic straws across its managed hotels in Asia Pacific by end of 2018.

All these little changes by big companies will make huge difference – that will help India in controlling its massive amounts of plastic waste. Talking about which, every year, India dumps down about 56 lakh tonnes of plastic waste – which is 60% of the total amount of plastic being dumped into oceans across the world. Imagine what happens if India absolutely stops dumping the crazy amount of plastic waste into oceans? Not that, even if we cut down the rate by half, it will relieve the oceans from 30% plastic crap being dumped in – that is certainly something to think about and implement, from today.